Graceport Imperilled

Graceport has been closed for ninety-five years. Unless they have leave from the Queen or one of her nine Ministers, no one goes in or out.

And that has kept everyone in. Whether born here sometime in the last century or old enough to have been here when the Decree of Isolation was issued, every citizen of Graceport has lived within the city nearly a century. And that means that they know it well. It’s busy. It’s cosmopolitan. It’s home.

There are more than 100,000 people in Graceport. And as the Capital of the Empire of Human Dominion (often called just "The Empire), political intrigue is rampant. Nobles, Religious Leaders, students of the arcane, and various trade and professional guilds all jockey for position with Queen Regina as she wages her “War On Chaos.”

But things in Graceport are changing—slowly. With the Decree of Isolation, the population is growing, and Regina is aging. She issued the decree herself ninety-five years ago, and she was beyond childhood even then. Her life has been incredibly long for a human, and many whisper that her “counselors” are actually positioning themselves for whomever will succeed her.

And more change: twelve years ago, in a grove of the Eastern part of the city which had been reserved for the elves, creatures calling themselves Eladrin appeared, claiming to have come from a plane called the Feywild. Led by Tiandra (called the Summer Queen) they won an audience with Regina, who gave them the grove as their sovereign territory. She went so far as to grant Tiandra and her designates diplomatic immunity from prosecution within the city. Though they haven’t abused the privilege, others note that it is the first time in the city’s history that any group has won such rights. With them, the Eladrin brought Gnomes into the city. The gnomes unsurprisingly brought mischief, which some found endearing and others found annoying.

Three years after the Eladrin “landing,” rumors began to circulate about some of the humans who had gained the capability to “shift” into an animal or animals. Though there have been no public displays of such activity, the rumors are widespread enough to be believed.

Perhaps most troubling, matters in Nine-Spires Cathedral have become heated and contentious. The Chancellors of organized faith for the nine major gods in Graceport have always existed in peaceful tolerance for one another before, but in the past several years, things have become competitive amongst the orders. A vicar was assaulted on the steps by a Priest of Kord. Though he was promptly excommunicated, he demonstrated the tensions within the religious orders.

Others groups are changing as well. The Mirror Enclave—the predominant Arcane organization; the collegium, a group of colleges for bards, administrators, mages, combat officers, and others; the Master Masons—a builder’s guild populated almost entirely of dwarves; the Huntsmen, a group of Elven hunters with some of the only travel privileges to and from the city; and others—all have commented on the city’s shifting.

And what about our bold adventuerers? Will they change with Graceport? Or will they try to prevent it?